Gleason: Underachieving Giants sent packing

Monday

Dec 31, 2012 at 2:00 AM

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — The Giants walked over Philadelphia before walking into the locker room to witness their playoff fate. All this talent assembled in one room and now they needed the Lions to beat the Bears, one underachieving team trying to help another.

KEVIN GLEASON

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — The Giants walked over Philadelphia before walking into the locker room to witness their playoff fate. All this talent assembled in one room and now they needed the Lions to beat the Bears, one underachieving team trying to help another.

Fans already in the parking lot or on their way out of the gates at MetLife Stadium turned on their electronics for updates from Detroit. The Giants had a bird's-eye view from their locker room, where everything began to crumble on Nov. 4 when Pittsburgh arrived to open the season's second half.

The Giants blew a 10-point fourth-quarter lead and lost 24-20. The next week they went to Cincinnati and suddenly looked like one of the worst teams in the league. From there it was, in typical Giants fashion, ups and downs across the final weeks, most everyone awaiting their late surge. Instead, the Giants looked as bad as anyone in losing to Atlanta and Baltimore by a combined 67-14.

That brought the Giants to late Sunday afternoon, fresh off a 42-7 win over the way-worse Eagles. The Giants huddled around TV sets as Jay Cutler scrambled 19 yards to Detroit's 34 with 2:42 left. When Matt Forte ran 13 yards for a first down two plays later, the Lions out of timeouts, three Cutler kneel-downs destroyed the Giants' remaining playoff hopes.

Not that the Giants gave themselves much of a chance. They needed four results in their favor — the win over Philly and the Bears, Vikings and Cowboys all losing. It was a pipe dream from the start.

"I am an optimistic person,'' said effervescent tight end Martellus Bennett. "I knew we were going to win, but I was not sure what else was going to happen.'' Or as he so eloquently said of the Giants needing multiple scenarios to unfold, "It's like five people juggling a baby — somebody's going to drop him.''

The Giants had no right making the playoffs come Sunday. That's not the worst thing in the NFL, especially coming off a world title, and it barely registered as disappointing against the backdrop of visitors affiliated with Sandy Hook Elementary School. But it's a bad job from a team that teased us the way the Lions teased the Giants and their fans by coming back on the Bears. The Giants opened the season 6-2 and during at least one point early on, following the 26-3 whitewash of San Francisco, looked like the very best team in the NFL.

Then the Giants showed us something else. They showed us the dangers of a team losing its edge and its hunger, if only a little, in a league that devours the slightest whiff of overconfidence and hubris. Somewhere between their win at Dallas on the last Sunday in October to the following two months, the Giants fell into a dark hole of entitlement, thinking they could substitute preparation and focus for pregame pep talks and postgame declarations.

How else to explain a team with this much talent getting routed in two must-win games on their way to a 3-5 finish? "I really do want to discuss with some of the players what in the world was the last two weeks all about,'' Tom Coughlin said. "Quite frankly, I'm anxious to find out if anybody has an opinion or an answer because our program, literally, is the same (each week) except for the emphasis throughout the course of our introduction to the next opponent.''

Many of us will be eagerly awaiting the results of Coughlin's investigation. Suffice to say that there is no simple answer when the coach himself has trouble pinpointing the blame. But in a league with precious little margin for error, mental approach is usually the tiebreaker.

The Giants talked afterward about displaying pride, as if beating a bottom-feeder while still in the playoff hunt made us channel "Braveheart.'' Sunday's win wasn't nearly as prideful as the previous two no-show losses were shameful.

So the Giants were left to watch their last drips of playoff hope swallowed by the Bears. Perhaps lessons were learned on the importance of controlling your own destiny. The Giants peeled off their uniforms and stepped out of the 2012 season.